Shadow Slave

Close to the evening, with the sun tiredly descending toward the horizon, a strange creature walked out of the colorless remains of the labyrinth. If "walking" was even the right word.

Dragging its legs in the sand, the creature somehow floated forward without moving them. It looked like a carapace centurion, or at least a close approximation of one.

All the necessary parts were in place. The creature had a black carapace with a menacing crimson pattern on it, a humanoid torso, eight segmented legs and two arms ending with formidable bone scythes. However, all these parts looked mismatched and strange, as though put together by some clumsy sculptor.

Additionally, the centurion moved as if it was seriously drunk.

The carapace was careening to one side, sometimes scraping against the sand. The torso was swinging back and forth for no apparent reason. The scythes were awkwardly lodged behind the creature's back, crossed against each other at a strange angle.

At some point, one of them simply dropped to the ground. The centurion stopped and hesitated for a few seconds, as though unsure what to do. Then it left its scythe arm behind and continued on its way as if nothing had happened.

A perceptive observer would have noticed that the creature seemed to possess two shadows. The first shadow was as one would expect, its shape identical to the creature itself. The second one resembled a human. It briefly showed itself from beneath the larger shadow when the centurion abandoned the runaway limb.

The human shadow then proceeded to facepalm and shake its head in utter contempt.

The whole situation was nothing short of being completely bizarre. But, for better or worse, there was nobody around to notice the weird creature.

Unobstructed, it traversed the wasteland, moving in the direction of the Ashen Barrow. Soon, it was almost at the footstep of the tall hill.

The sunset was approaching.

***

The strange centurion plopped on the ground at the base of the Ashen Barrow and stopped moving completely. Awkward and lopsided, it looked like a parody of the other monster of its kind who had kneeled gracefully at the same spot a few days prior.

without a tribute. There was no transcendent soul shard in sight. Added to the disrespectful pose, this transgression was more than enough to

Perhaps… it was suicidal.

of the setting sun. Encased in bright metal, with a crown of horns adorning his head, the demon looked fearsome and sinister. Gazing

Shifting his terrifying scythes, the giant monster walked forward, slowly descending from the hill to face the

as he approached. However, the bizarre centurion did not even flinch. In fact, it remained completely

its pathetic appearance might be a trap. The labyrinth

that was what the three

However, they were wrong.

scythe flashed through the air, severing the centurion's torso in half. The adamantine chitin was

of the Ashen Barrow, Sunny, who was running up the

That was too soon!

they would have more time. Who knew that the Carapace Demon would turn out to be such

Sunny gritted his

time to switch

pieces of chitin away

of a dead carapace centurion to disguise the Echo, which was much smaller

to lure the demon away. The three of them were going to circle the hill and hide themselves under the grey sand in advance, then

would dismiss the Echo, thus finishing the first stage of the

of aggression had messed up the timing of the whole thing. The decoy was already destroyed, yet they weren't even

it could stall the

there was

Echo tried to hide itself beneath the Carapace Demon's massive body. It was doing the same thing that Nephis had done when fighting the first carapace centurion, intending to use the size of the enemy against

as opposed to a squishy human girl who had no protection. Even if the demon tried to crush the scavenger with its weight, it wouldn't be able

the demon